Today’s most popular dog names are Max and Bella. In the Middle Ages, though, dogs would answer to names like Amiable. Or Nosewise. Or even … Clench. ? Is the term redneck derogatory? Some folks proudly claim that name. They say...
Come on over for dinner, we’ll knock a tater in the head or something! This lovely form of a dinner invite came to us from Vera, a listener in British Columbia who heard it while living in Arkansas. This is part of a complete episode...
A pitch-in is Indiana’s preferred term for a potluck dinner, as Sabrina learned after moving to Indianapolis from Seattle. When classmates announced a pitch-in, she didn’t know what they meant, and friends from Ohio and family in the South were...
Everyone knows about Tang as that orange kick in a glass, but could it also be an entree? A listener from Plano, Texas, found an elderly relative’s plan for family meals from 1947, which lists “tang with molasses” as a main course...
What’s for dinner? How about wind pudding, air sauce, and a side of balloon trimmings? This colorful euphemism for “nothing” dates as far back as the American Civil War, when troops would come into the mess tent, see a wild...
A riddle from A World’s Treasury of Riddles by Phil Cousineau asks, “A riddle, a riddle, I suppose, a thousand eyes and never a nose.” The trick depends on hearing eyes as something besides a face part. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript...